When comparing Spectacle vs aText, the Slant community recommends Spectacle for most people. In the question“What are the best power user tools for macOS?”Spectacle is ranked 37th while aText is ranked 45th. The most important reason people chose Spectacle is:

Spectacle is licensed under MIT with source code available on [GitHub](https://github.com/eczarny/spectacle).

Has common HTML & JS snippets built-in

Pro

Has built-in snippets for common typos

Pro

Snippets can include editable fields

Pro

Data can be synced through cloud storage services

Pro

Snippets can include a wide variety of variables

Possible variables include date, time, other snippets, clipboard content, etc.

Pro

A snippet can be expanded to plain or styled text and include pictures

Cons

Con

Impossible to add new functions

While keyboard shortcuts can be changed for the available actions, there is no way to add custom actions which in turn limits the functionality of the app.

Con

Doesn't work with any Adobe products

There are some apps like Adobe Reader that do not work with Spectacle. Basically, any app with a heavily customized UI that breaks OS X accessibility will not work correctly under Spectacle.

Con

Limited window sizing capabilities

You can use 1/2 of the screen vertically and horizontally (divide into 4 parts). You can also use the screen in thirds too, but only the left and right third: you can't use the 1/3 in the center. There is no way to do a more granular distribution.

Con

Frequent crashes in MacOS Sierra

aText crashes frequently, and the developer is unresponsive. Not clear if app is supported or under current development: last update was in 11/15; last post to aText Facebook page 10/15.